Know your own heart, and trust it.

Animals instinctively know they cannot trust a person who is in fear. It’s amazing when we are able to truly grasp this understanding, this deepest knowing of the truth and make choices from that knowing. Any person who seeks to draw others into their own struggle with fear is going to spiral that fear, because actions from fear as the underlying emotion are not Divinely Inspired. Fear begets fear, and love begets love. Until we get back into our own heart and listen for what feels like light, and love and trust in ourselves, and in love being the foundation of everything. Creating a foundation of trust and faith in love and light as the fabric of everything is the only remedy to those spirals within each of us.

When we embrace the understanding that every human being has the best understanding within their own hearts to choose their own path, we stop ourselves from drawing others into our own fear based spirals. Only when we look within our own hearts and support, or at least trust, others to do the same does Divine Grace shine the light on inspired solutions. And, at least in my own experience, if a solution is divinely inspired, others will join in from their own internal seeing... that’s how it works. Like the field of dreams, if you build it they will come. If it’s built from fear, the results will show immediately. If it’s built from love it will flow, grow and flourish. That is not actually rocket science. I am not saying that difficult times do not present themselves, but that we are the only ones who are capable of knowing our own path through, and what it all means to us.

Boundaries and doing what it takes to get others to cease and desist from anything that feels not ok to us, that is self love that when practiced vigilantly builds up an internal store that enables a feeling of infinite love for others, regardless of their behavior. That is what it means to be a warrior of the heart... to me anyway. People, all beings, who can’t trust and honor boundaries are living in fear, and cannot be trusted. That’s pretty much common sense in my world. My body, my choice... my life, my choice... my mind, my choice, period. ✨💝✨🙏🏼✨💝✨

No is the new yes.

I truly believe that working on feeling love for everyone and everything is possible and it is the road to freedom. However, loving and resonating with is certainly not the same thing. If loving everything meant liking and choosing everything, if there were no contrast to give us all different tastes and flavors, life would become incredibly boring don’t you think? Loving is about seeing the light of consciousness in all beings, and in the world around us. Liking is figuring out what resonates with us, what floats our boats, finding the things that feel like love light and solution for each of us. Whatever feels accurate and inspired in our own heart, that is resonation, and that may shift at any given moment... and that is a-ok. 

I love this crazy meme because it takes that understanding and can help to release us from taking another person’s opinion of us personally. It can also help us accept and honor our own feelings and preferences, and free us from self-judgment. Loving and respecting others does not necessarily mean inviting them, or their thoughts and opinions, into our lives. It means appreciating everyone as reflections of contrasted consciousness, and deciding for ourselves how close or far we’d like to be from them. That’s why healthy boundaries can really help us feel more loving towards others. It's been my experience that trying to force myself to resonate with something that I do not resonate with does not yield a positive feeling result for me, quite the contrary in fact.

Standing up and saying no can be the most powerful loving act a person can choose. As the slightly altered Maggie Kuhn quote says, "Speak the truth even if your voice shakes." But always check in with your heart first, because that really is the only place our own truths can be found. And I have found that when I am speaking from that place, my voice does indeed often shake, and sometimes tears come too. It's as though something inside of me, something wonderful and Divine, is pushing the words out of me. And that has always yielded an amazing result in my life. I have deep gratitude for those moments in my life.

The beautiful thing is, when we give ourselves the space that feels loving to ourselves, we are more able to observe all people and things with the eyes of the heart. I am working on loving it all, knowing that it's all consciousness, and I am also working on surrounding myself with whatever floats my boat. That is how I truly can grow to feel love for everyone and everything more and more every day. And that is most definitely the road to freedom, IMHO. 

There is a bonfire in your heart...

I recently found the following words written in the middle of an old empty journal. I wrote it on August 24, 1997. I don't remember writing it, it really took me by surprise. I cry every time I read it. I can only guess that I had a rather powerful meditation and then grabbed the nearest journal and wrote this down to be found later... as in now, ha ha ha. 

When I first read this it was unbelievably perfect timing... that has always been my experience of Gurumayi in my life. I met her when I was ten, I think. She was Malti then, not a Swami yet, but she gave me shaktipat all the same the moment that I met her... and has lived in my heart ever since, and quite possibly even before that day.

I want to share this for myself, and maybe also for those of you who feel to read it. I think there are words in it that are true for all of you, not just for me. So I offer this from my heart to all of you. We are all love, no matter what we may think about ourselves... we are all love, every one of us, at our core, through and through. 

Here is what I wrote:

August 24, 1997

Thank you Gurumayi

These are messages I received today from Gurumayi, my guru.

You are always pure gold, I have always seen you this way.

Giving and receiving happen without effort if you just relax.

You have always been worthy of all you have received.

I am always with you and you are always with me.

You are Love, everyone else has always seen this, allow yourself to see it now.

There is a bonfire in your heart, if you go there you will be reminded.

Have patience with yourself, you will find your way there.

I love you!

Contemplating the practice of consciously choosing our information intake.

I've been contemplating the practice of consciously choosing the information and perspectives that I connect with and the factors I use to decide. How it feels emotionally, heavy or light. Does it feel like love, solution, expansive, freedom? Is it helping me support what feels accurate and helpful in my own heart for me? Does it feel like freedom or does it feel confining? How is my body reacting to the information and what does that mean. For those of us that believe that everything is consciousness, that can really only be the one true fact because consciousness is 100% malleable, so everything that it creates is as well. Embracing that understanding changes the way we navigate. The emotions that any experience or information brings up can be shifted when the experience or information is reframed. That obviously will work in either direction, which is one reason that meditation can be very helpful. It teaches us to observe our thoughts without entangling ourselves in the story so we are able to see our patterns and decide what is still working for us, and what has become outdated and can be reframed and or released.

Consciously practicing reframing information towards lighter perspectives can be what some people call finding the silver lining, or even just realizing that our information or perspective could actually be totally wrong, or outdated. That is one reason that I love to find out that I am wrong about things, to have new information shift my own perception completely. That retrains my brain to let go of things that are no longer serving the momentum that I am wishing to keep in my life towards lighter, more fun, more easeful perspectives.

It can be very easy to open up to this when you realize that being wrong can be such a wonderful gift to us, right? It can be a happy surprise! I have worked with many people that have held the understanding that being wrong was a negative thing, that being right was always best. That is clearly learned behavior because it is obviously only the ego that cares about such things. The heart loves to learn, to grow, to be surprised and opened to new possibilities. So the heart loves to be ‘wrong’, ha ha ha. Obviously, there is no such thing as right or wrong on a higher level of understanding, but when being wrong can be a joyful experience and offer us the feeling of freedom when we find new information that feels right in the now. So being wrong is a beautiful thing!

Years ago I read about Buddha heads being cut off of statues in Asia by colonials, to make them easier to transport. What I read gave the impression that this was the only reason that Buddha heads existed. So for years, I had a bit of a weird and negative feeling about Buddha heads. I recently found out that is not true, that Buddha heads symbolize the Buddha’s enlightened state and the wisdom and wealth of knowledge that he attained. Yay for being wrong! Ha ha ha! I am not interested in information that opens me to fear but I will always welcome new information that gives me a more positive, fun and light perspective on anything!

It has been my experience that internal guidance and the enlightened beings that I have known do not tend to give warnings, plant seeds of fear, or point at anything we are not wanting in our lives. They might point out or bring to the surface fears we already have so that we may walk through them and overcome those fears. That is where practicing reframing really becomes incredibly helpful, ha ha ha. Reframing with humor is one of the best ways to lighten things up quickly. Finding the humor in any situation is a fantastic gift we can give ourselves. Think of Laughing Buddha, finding the humor in everything is incredibly powerful. It has been my experience that internal guidance always shows us where we are wanting to go. It shows us open doors, solutions, exciting new possibilities and redirects us using light and sparkle, rather than giving obstacles attention and focus. I know that I am hearing my internal guidance when I am in the throes of fear, and suddenly a lighter perspective explodes the darker one and gives me a wonderful laugh or burst of joy.

The momentum of higher perspectives is always from love and a deeper understanding of the nature of reality. The higher perspectives are obviously more planted in the knowledge of the play of consciousness, of the illusion, the maya, the vibrational nature of our world. The vibrational nature of our world makes it completely malleable, vibrating energy is not stuck, it is not solid. Solid is an illusion that we enjoy, it helps us experience our world more fully. It helps us play and learn and feel the confinement that then gives us the wonderful experience of freedom! And that is why the only truth is that everything is simultaneously true and not true. And that is why information is only as useful as it’s ability to support our chosen experiences, our goals, our dreams, our heart journeys.

That is why I try to be aware of the information and perspectives that I open myself up to and to find a way to either politely walk away, or set a boundary if necessary. If I find myself dealing with something that is creating fear I will work to reframe it, to find a silver lining or perspective that releases the fear. At times I have even been able to flip information completely, into information that actually shows me the true nature of the world as I see it… Love. When I am able to do that, it is the most wonderful experience of all. It is my understanding and experience that Divine Grace is pure consciousness, everything is made of consciousness and Divine Grace is Love, so everything is Love. That understanding gives me the ability to find my way through very difficult experiences and find my way back to my heart.

Again, that is why meditation and various present moment practices can be so useful. Being able to pause, observe our thoughts and emotions in the moment helps us figure out which information feels like it is supporting us, supporting our hearts. It actually helps us to get to know our own hearts, to find out what inspires us and gives us actual joy. Boundaries are incredibly useful in this world where we all are so excited to share our experiences and perspectives with each other. That is a beautiful and wonderful desire, however, our experiences and perspectives will not serve everyone the way that they serve us. Understanding that brings so much freedom to us, to our relationships and to our world. When we understand this, communication can be so much simpler, in both directions. Judging ourselves and others, and also taking things personally becomes more and more silly when we genuinely understand this, and that right there is such a wonderful freedom! Finding silliness can be the most wonderful cure for so many issues in life, ha ha ha.

Ok, I guess that is my piece for today so… peace out everyone! Love and silliness to all y’all.

The Thing About Love & Respect...

When you work on loving and respecting yourself, you concern yourself less and less with what other people think or do. You begin to realize that the thoughts and actions of others are only letting you know when you are listening from your heart. Your heart will only ever inspire you to love yourself and others more, it will only speak to you with a positive voice. The heart speaks from love, from lightness of being, from kind and playful humor. When I listen to the joyful noise I am hearing my heart's voice, this I know for myself for dang sure. Huzzah! ;-)

And, of course, when you work on loving and respecting yourself, you genuinely hope for everyone to do the same. When you work on loving and respecting yourself your ability to feel compassion for others grows and as that compassion grows it is like a big bubble that melts animosity for others, even those that you do not understand at all. Agenda no longer feels good, only inspiration does. Appreciation starts to feel more and more delicious to your soul, and of course, you will begin to notice more and more people in your life treating you with love and respect. That's how it works, just like happiness, it's an inside job.

Go look in a mirror and think of someone that you love very very much, someone that inspires and gives you a feeling of joy. When you have connected with those wonderful feelings, then look into your own beautiful eyes and say I love you to your own sweet self. There are many ways to work on loving and respecting yourself more, this is just one simple easy way to start shifting the inner momentum. It takes bravery for some. Try it, especially if it sounds ridiculous and feels embarrassing, in fact... just try it and see if you notice any shift at all.